


tell me all your secrets

by siojo



Series: Younger Luffy AU [6]
Category: One Piece
Genre: M/M, younger Luffy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-07-04
Packaged: 2018-07-20 01:30:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7385551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/siojo/pseuds/siojo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A vote is taken and plans are made. Little is seen of Luffy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tell me all your secrets

Marco knows that there’s things that Ace doesn’t tell him.

It obvious in the way that Ace will go quiet for hours, sitting on a corner of their bed his head on his hands as he stares at nothing, in the way Ace will blitz through paperwork on days where he couldn’t sleep and Marco kept waking to Ace trying to bury his face into the pillow to keep himself quiet.

It doesn’t mean that Marco likes it, but he knows there has to be a reason. After all, Pops hasn’t sent Ace on a public mission during the two years that he’s been part of the crew, not even to announce his change of loyalty.

When Ace leaves for missions, it’s with a shirt covering his back and members of the Spade Pirates as his backup. One of the other commanders follows at a distance, ensuring that nothing gets out of hand, but neither Ace or Pops seem to be willing to correct the assumption that the Spade Pirates are still a force running about on the sea.

Marco hates it. It drives him mad, trying to figure it out without getting the others suspicious, but not even Haruta has the answers that Marco wants. Not that she would share them even if she did. Haruta likes to hoard the knowledge gained through their vast spy network, sharing only when there’s something important or something that needs to be taken care of.

Which is why when Ace returns from his night watch, eyes darting everywhere but Marco, and his fingers tapping against his biceps like they’re a piano, Marco knows something has changed.

“Ace?”

“Hey Luffy,” Ace ignores him, squatting down to put himself on level with Luffy. “Pops says that he had a story that he wanted to tell you today. He’s already waiting, if you hurry you can hear it before breakfast starts.”

Luffy bounces, “Okay!”

“Go on then,” Ace laughs, forced and almost bitter. He waits until Luffy’s voice has vanished as much as it can on this ship, before standing back up and finally, finally looking at Marco. “I need to tell you something.”

Marco wishes sometimes that he had Thatch’s ability to defuse situations with jokes. Times like now where Ace looks like he’s going to lose everything and his shoulders are tensed.

“Alright,” Marco agrees softly. “Do you want to sit down?”

“The Marines are after me.” Ace blurts out. Marco wants to laugh because the Marines are after all of them. “They found out my name.”

“They already know your name,” Marco says confusion obvious.

Ace flinches, “Portgas is my mom’s name. Because my father’s is dangerous to have.” Ace ducks his head, but his hand twitches towards his hat, as if he wants to pull it down over his face. “He’s been dead for almost twenty one years and it’s still too dangerous to claim relation to him.”

“And the Marines didn’t know about this before?”

“Gramps does, he’s a Vice Admiral, but he also promised my father to protect me and my mom and then promised my mom to ensure that I would be safe. And he did. I’m nineteen, I never thought I would live to be an adult when I was younger.” Ace smiles sadly. “But they’ll capture me and announce who my father is and execute me for his sins, not even my own.”

“Ace, how are you nineteen if your father died twenty one years ago?”

Ace grins, almost real, proud, “My mom extended her pregnancy to twenty months. Long enough to escape suspicion, but it also killed her.”

“And your father?”

“Gol D Roger.” Ace answers, fingers digging into his arms. “The Pirate King.”

Marco feels the roar of nothing in his ears, his mind already trying to reconcile the man that Pops had fought with and against with the man that Marco’s fallen in love with. He startles back to himself as Ace takes a step backwards towards the door, finally hearing when he’s saying.

“I’m sorry. I’ll have my things out by morning. I…”

“What are you talking about?” Marco asks. “I’m not mad.”

Marco is mad. He’s furious, but not at Ace, he doesn’t think he’s ever been so enraged by the Marines. At least not in years.

“W-what?”

“I’m not mad, not at you. You are you, Ace, you’re not your father.” He steps closer, moving slowly, knowing Ace is skittish when he’s nervous. “I don’t care who your family is, I love you.”

Ace makes a small broken noise as Marco pulls him into a hug. Marco wonders if anyone has ever told him that before. That they don’t care who his family is and that they still love him, then again, Marco doesn’t think Ace has told many people who his father is.

“The Marines know?” Marco asks when Ace’s calmed down, slumping against Marco’s chest.

“Yeah, Ray sent a note in the letter that Shakky got to me, he said that someone knows my name.” Ace pulls back enough to finally look at Marco. “I called, but best we can figure is that Teach said something about my friends and one of the Marines was smarter than normal.”

Marco sighs, “Alright. Who else knows?”

“You and Pops,” Ace answers tiredly, one hand coming up to scrub at his eyes. “I wanted to tell you myself, before we told the rest of the commanders, because if they’re really gunning for me, it won’t be long before they realize that the Spade Pirates have disbanded and joined up with Whitebeard.”

“Which you still haven’t explained to me.”

Ace flushes, “That was my idea. I know custody of children is weird, I mean Gramps never did any paperwork for me, but I was worried that he would take Luffy away. If he didn’t know that I had joined with Pops then he would still be hunting for my ship and he wouldn’t come here.”

“Who is your Gramps?”

“Ah.” Ace laughs. “I forgot that I never told you. His name’s Garp, Monkey D. Garp. He’s Luffy’s grandfather.”

“Next question,” Marco is going to get this answer if Ace is in the mood to talk, he wants it. “Who is Luffy’s dad?”

“Dragon, I’ve never met him.” Ace admits. “But Ray says that I should assume that Dragon knows exactly where his son is and who’s caring for him. I guess he doesn’t have a problem with it, since he hasn’t tried to take him away from me.”

Marco snorts, leaning down to give Ace a kiss, “Okay.” He loosens his grip on him and prods him towards the bed. “Okay. Get in bed before you fall down.”

Ace flops down with a grumble, feet dangling off the edge as he tries to kick off his boots and his hat fallen over his face. Marco rolls his eyes, smile on his face, as he moves to help him.

This is his, his family, and Marco will kill anyone that tries to take it from him.

Ace grumbles, turning to bury his face into a pillow and Marco shakes his head, mussing Ace’s hair before he leaves the room. Luffy still has to be taken care of and there’s work to be done. Flames dart down his hands, blue and yellow and bright, and Marco takes a deep breath.

Anyone who tries to take his family from him won’t live through the attempt. Marco isn’t as forgiving as Ace and he won’t let anyone threaten what is his and live to make a second attempt.

–

Ace feels jittery as the rest of the commanders pour into the meeting room, the only thing keeping him from panicking is Marco’s hand on his, held tight and his thumb moving over the back of Ace’s hand.

It’s one thing, telling Pops and Marco, both of whom had fought with his father and had known him. Had stories that revolved around Gol D Roger the man more then the monster. But most of the other commanders were young, young enough to never have met him.

And what would Jozu and Vista think of him after this?

“What is this about?” Izo asks curiously.

Haruta grins, “Is this about the unnatural Marine movements?” She blinks at the others when they turn to stare at her. “Oh, come off it, there’s enough communication going around that a rookie would notice. I heard that Sengoku might be moving from his office to join in.”

“Sengoku’s been doing office work since Roger was caught,” Vista waves off her comments. Ace tightens his grip on Marco’s hand. “He wouldn’t leave his desk for anything.”

“Unless they confirmed that Roger had a son,” Ace says, ducking his head as the rest of the table looks at him. “That’s why the Marines are moving. They’ve confirmed the existence of Roger’s son. They know his name and they have his picture, they just don’t know where he is.”

Jozu, drooping from his night watch, jerks upright, “Roger has a kid? Haruta?”

“I haven’t heard anything.” She shrugs.

Ace swallows thickly, “Rayleigh keeps me informed. He told me what’s happening.”

“And the Dark King would know,” Jozu agrees. “What do we know about the kid? Well, he’s gotta be about twenty. Maybe twenty-one.”

“He’s nineteen,” Marco corrects, ignoring the looks shot his way. “And he’s a decent person. At least I think he is.”

Fossa raises an eyebrow, cigar unlit, “You’ve met him then.”

“Yes.”

“So are we helping him,” Kingdew asks, he blinks at the looks shot his way. “Pops was friends with Roger, it’s just as bad as if one of us was being hunted down because of our relationship to Pops.”

Rakyuo tilts his head, “Can we afford to get involved?”

Ace feels his eyes start to water, trying to filter out the arguments going on around him. It’s too much and he yanks his hand back, shoving himself out of his chair with Marco quick to follow.

“I…” He licks his lips and his shoulders shake. “I’ll be off the ship by nightfall.”

Marco grabs him by the shoulders, his face exasperated and kind, “Stop saying that you’re leaving. Pops,” He turns to look back at Whitebeard. “Convince Ace to stop being stupid.”

“Ace, sit down son.” Whitebeard sighs, taking a swallow of his sake. “We aren’t finished talking.”

“Why is Ace leaving?” Thatch asks horrified. “Seriously, what is going on?”

Ace turns, his eyes going to Marco, before he ducks his head again, “I’m Roger’s son. It’s me, that’s why Rayleigh told me they were coming and why I know that they have my name and picture. That’s why Marco knows how old I am. I’m Roger’s son.”

He closes his eyes, waiting for someone to speak up, to declare that he get out, for him to leave and never return. He feels his hands close into fists and his shoulders shake and Marco’s hands move down to his biceps, holding him in place. Ace is glad, because he’s going to run the moment that Marco lets go.

“Well, that isn’t what I was expecting,” Vista says finally. Ace makes a noise that is almost a laugh. “But he’s already a member of this family and I never had a problem with Roger.”

“Agreed,” Jozu mutters, head falling onto the table. “You have a better mustache then Roger’s anyway Vista.”

“Jozu’s votes don’t count until he gets more sleep,” Marco states calmly. “He’s obviously impaired and I don’t want to use him until I’m certain that he won’t do something he regrets later.”

“Passed,” Vista agrees calmly, eyebrow twitching upwards.

“So are we voting if Ace is allowed to run off on his own or are we trying to come up with a plan that doesn’t involve us trying to letting him be an idiot?” Curiel asks in confusion. “Because I don’t think he should go alone. Who’s going to keep Luffy in check with him gone.”

“Luffy would go to Rayleigh,” Ace answers, letting himself be shoved back into his chair. “I wouldn’t leave him here.”

Marco sighs, “I’m not letting you leave alone, would you stop this?” He turns back to the rest of the table. “We need to make a plan.”


End file.
